Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi addresses participants during the opening session of the World Economic Forum on ASEAN Wednesday, Sept. 12, 2018 in Hanoi, Vietnam. The World Economic Forum has attracted hundreds of participants for the three-day forum with the theme: ASEAN 4.0: Entrepreneurship and the Fourth Industrial Revolution. (AP Photo/Bullit Marquez)

Myanmar's Suu Kyi to skip UN General Assembly session

HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — A senior Myanmar official has confirmed that the country’s leader, State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, will not attend the U.N. General Assembly session beginning next week in New York.

Minister for International Cooperation Kyaw Tin, who is accompanying Suu Kyi at a meeting of the World Economic Forum in Vietnam, said “She has no plan to go there.”

He was responding to a report in the Myanmar newspaper 7 Days citing a Myanmar foreign ministry official as saying that Suu Kyi would not attend the U.N. meeting, which starts Sept. 18. No reason was given.

Suu Kyi, who took power in 2016, also did not attend last year’s General Assembly meeting. Myanmar’s military is facing international pressure over human rights abuses committed against the Rohingya Muslim minority.